The Yeare's Midnight (8 page)

‘You have to tell him,’ said Paul, reading her mind. ‘It’s the only way now.’

‘I know, but it’s not as easy as that.’

‘Nothing worthwhile ever is.’ He took her hand. Julia shivered. He felt warm. Paul Heyer. He was her lover. HER LOVER.
The thought was absurd. She was a woman on the cusp of middle age. People like her didn’t have lovers. They had headaches and gardening gloves.

‘It’s been eighteen years, Paul. You can’t just throw it away.’

He was getting frustrated with her. ‘You already have, Julia. It’s a dead marriage. The rest is paperwork. And courage’

‘You’ve been through all this yourself.’ She didn’t feel at all courageous. The prospect of telling John she didn’t love him any more made her feel sick. ‘This is all new to me.’ She was crying. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

He smiled softly at her. ‘You’re right, I have been through it myself and it’s pretty horrible. But I’ll tell you one thing: I have never regretted it. If you’ve got a cancer you don’t pretend that everything’s all right and hope the problem goes away. You cut it out.’ He could see she agreed with him. ‘We can’t go on like this, can we? I am tired of all this lying and sneaking about.’

‘Me too. And I’m sure he knows that something’s wrong. He’s too sharp not to have noticed something.’

‘All the more reason to tell him now. He’ll find out sooner or later. Isn’t it better that you do it on your own terms?’

‘You don’t understand, Paul. He’s not well. He’s depressed or something. I don’t know how he’d cope if I wasn’t there. He’s hopeless. Like a child sometimes.’

‘You can’t think like that. It kills me to see you like this. Let’s be clear. You don’t have to worry about money. You don’t have to worry about having somewhere to stay. You just have to be brave.’ His voice was quiet but insistent. Paul Heyer was a patient man and he was in love – but he was too old to mess around. Life was like business: profit or loss. She either wanted to be with him or she didn’t. Julia cradled her glass and glanced at the clock nervously.

Heather Stussman’s bedside clock beeped once at midnight. She was awake and worried. She had seen the news and wasn’t sure how to react. The phone call earlier in the day seemed unreal now. She wanted to think it hadn’t happened. She was afraid. She had checked and double-checked the lock on her doors. The college gates were locked at nine. She knew she was safe. What should she do? She had tried calling Mark and her mother but had got no reply. She would have to figure this one out for herself.

A
man
had
called
her,
told
her
to
watch
the
news
and
explain
it
to
the
police.

She had dismissed him as a crank, a practical joker or an irritating colleague. Then she had seen the news. A local girl murdered. Was this what the guy had meant? She hadn’t made the connection at once. The images of the cottage, of police cars, of the ambulance had all flashed across her TV screen. It didn’t click until the newsreader had mentioned Lucy Harrington’s name for the second time. Then she knew that she would have to call the police.

11 December

Underwood woke slowly and painfully, uncertain where he was. A phone was ringing. He ignored it. There was a pain in the back of his neck and he had chronic pins and needles in his left arm. He sat up at his desk. It was morning. There was movement in the corridor outside. Harrison pushed the door open. He seemed surprised.

‘Sorry, guv, I didn’t think you were here.’

‘I hardly am.’

‘I didn’t mean to barge in. I heard the phone ringing. I didn’t think you’d be in yet.’

‘What time is it?’

The phone had stopped ringing. ‘Six-forty-five,’ Harrison said.

‘Jesus. Do you always get in this early?’ Underwood’s eyes felt like bricks wedged into his head.

‘Mostly. I jog in, then shower here.’ Joe Harrison was tall and athletic, the only black CID officer in New Bolden. Underwood knew that Harrison had been a victim of racial prejudice within the force in the past. Some people would have lost heart: Harrison just seemed to get tougher, more determined to succeed. He was a year or two junior to Dexter, another refugee from the Met. They would make a formidable partnership one day – assuming they didn’t kill each other first.

‘Jogging?’ Underwood asked. ‘What for?’

‘It’s habit, really,’ Harrison continued. ‘I never sleep well. Do you want a coffee or something?’

‘Milk. Two sugars.’ Harrison rushed off. Underwood recalled the previous evening’s events. An exhausted sadness gnawed at his heart. Did he really care any more? He wondered where Julia had spent the night, what she had done with the man he had seen. Underwood was falling through emptiness, clutching at branches that wouldn’t bear his weight. He had to clear his head. Who was this fucking bloke anyway? Who was this fucking bloke who was fucking his wife? He flipped open his notebook and looked at the car registration number: S245 QXY. More than just a number. The code to his misery. He decided he did care. A lot. It would be a long day for everybody.

Harrison returned, carrying two steaming coffees. He placed one on the desk. Underwood watched him carefully.

‘Did we get anything from the house-to-house? Didn’t anybody see anything?’ the inspector asked.

‘Hardly anything.’ Harrison sat down, ‘A woman who lives off London Road – you know The Crescent?’ Underwood nodded as he sipped his coffee. ‘She says that a white van was parked in her road from seven that night and had gone the
following morning. We asked at the other houses but no one else saw a thing.’

Underwood scowled. ‘This coffee is disgusting. Did the woman see the driver? Can she give us a description?’

‘No.’

‘Marvellous. Did she know what type of van? Can she remember the registration?’

‘Only that she thought it looked like an RSPCA van. She was worried they might have come for her cat.’

‘What do the RSPCA inspectors drive? Those small Sherpa things?’

‘Not sure, guv. I’ll check it out.’ Harrison pulled a Post-It off Underwood’s pad and scribbled a note to himself.

‘It’s not much but it’s a start. If he has a van like that he might be a plumber or a joiner.’

‘If it’s our man.’ Harrison seemed doubtful.

‘What about this bloody poem thing? The text on the wall? Any joy there?’

Harrison shook his head. ‘Dexter is going to the library this morning. She’s got an old squeeze who works there, apparently. I left it with her. She seemed a bit tense. I didn’t want to step on her toes.’ He left the statement hanging. Underwood got the message. ‘I better get on, guv.’ The detective sergeant stood and stretched. He was still wearing his jogging gear.

‘Before you go.’ Underwood handed over the piece of paper on which he had written Paul Heyer’s registration number. ‘There was a call last night after you’d gone. Some woman. Wouldn’t give her name. She said she saw a car driving down Hartfield Road late on Monday night. BMW, she thought. She had to swerve to avoid it. It’s probably just a pisshead on a magical mystery tour but it might be worth checking out.’

‘Bit weird. The fact she got the whole number, late at night.’

‘Who’s to say she got the
right
number, though? As I say, I doubt it’s anything but we should check it out.’

‘Fair enough. I’ll run it through the computer.’ Harrison left the room and closed the door firmly behind him.

Underwood smiled to himself. He was taking a calculated risk. Still, Harrison would come back with a name and that
would give him an advantage over Julia. Maybe he would pull the bloke in for questioning and rough him up a bit. It would be interesting to hear his alibi for Monday night. There was a cruel symmetry in all this that amused him. He felt his chin. He needed a shave. It was grey outside. Dawn was beginning to streak against the sky. The phone started ringing again. He got up and walked out of his office along the corridor to the gents. The phone jangled faintly behind him as he closed the cubicle door. It was their wedding anniversary in three days. Maybe he’d ask for a divorce then: more symmetry. Underwood felt mucus crawling up his throat, saliva creeping across his dry tongue. He leaned over the pan and was sick.

Dexter drove away from the library car park. Her librarian contact, Dan, was an ex-boyfriend and was far less attractive than she had remembered. She smiled bitterly to herself and wondered why Fate always cast such tossers in her direction. Still, despite his lack of personality, Dan had been extremely helpful: he’d recognized the line of text immediately and had recited the rest of the piece. He was arrogant with his intelligence. It was a fragment from a poem by a writer whom she had never heard of. She was none the wiser in reality but at least they had identified the source. Underwood could figure out the rest.

Dexter considered calling him on her mobile. She decided not to. It was as if she needed to tell him face to face. She felt that if she called him it would somehow detract from what she had discovered. In her absence, Underwood would most likely call in Harrison to discuss the information. Then the line of responsibility for turning up this piece of evidence would be blurred. She would get no recognition. Female officers needed recognition more than the men. They had more obstacles to overcome: they had to attach themselves more aggressively to success stories or
risk being overlooked in the general orgy of backslapping. She wondered if she was making excuses.

Dexter had always felt an inexplicable need to prove herself to Underwood.
Prove
herself.
Was that the right way to express it? No. It wasn’t so much proving herself as wanting to please him. The thought made her shudder. Dexter had tried to purge herself of flirtatiousness, of the clinginess she so despised in some other female officers.

She turned her car along the dual carriageway that swung alongside New Bolden Parkway station. Was she any different from Jensen? The WPC overtly flirted with male officers, even slept with some of them. Didn’t Dexter’s own desire to please Underwood grow from the same emotional root? She wondered what that was. Insecurity? A perception of inferiority? Absence of a paternal influence? She almost made herself laugh at that last one. Dexter hadn’t known her own father so she didn’t regard herself as an expert. However, Underwood didn’t strike her as much of a father figure. He was weak, even vulnerable in many ways. She often felt that she was carrying him, nursing him through his insecurities and inefficiencies. Her mind flipped the question over. Perhaps it was some misguided maternal instinct in her. The thought made her shiver. She wondered if she was going mad.

Dexter tried to clear her head, to focus on other things. She always found it hard to concentrate first thing in the mornings. Maybe because the previous night’s dreams and nightmares were still close: still swimming near to the surface in the back of her mind. Her head was a wrecking ground early in the morning: thoughts and emotions scattered without meaning, ideas that were once beautiful smashed to pieces.

Concentrate. She stared through the dirty glass windscreen at the white lines sliding beneath her and the stretch of grey tarmac arcing to the right ahead. She tried to build a logical structure. This was always her reaction to concepts she couldn’t understand. It usually worked.
A
girl
is
killed
with
a
hammer.
Why?
Ease
of
execution.
Dexter tried not to smile at her unintentional pun.

A
hammer
blow
to
the
back
of
the
head
will
undoubtedly
put
the
victim
down
quickly.
Possibly
even
kill
them
immediately.
That’s
what
happened
to
Lucy
Harrington.
She
was
a
strong
girl,
an
athlete.
Maybe
our
killer
didn’t
fancy
his
chances
face
to
face.
Is
he
physically
weak?
The
killing
blow
would
have
hap
pened
very
quickly.
Maybe
the
act
of
killing
doesn’t
excite
him.
The
eye.
That’s
why
he
killed
her.
That’s
the
key
to
all
this.

Dexter pulled up at a traffic light. There was a scruffy-looking man with a silver nose-stud selling roses at the roadside: five for three pounds.
Flowers.
Flowers
are
important
to
him.
Does
he
deliver
flowers?
Is
that
how
he
found
Lucy
Harring
ton?
She discounted the idea. It was too obvious, too easy to trace. The killer was too smart for that.
And
then
there’s
the
poem.
Written
in
blood
on
a
white-tiled
wall.
Very
melodram
atic.
A
cliché,
almost.
The
killer
wants
us
to
read
the
poem.
Why?
How
can
a
poem
written
four
hundred-odd
years
ago
be
important?
Eyes,
flowers
and
poetry:
another
interesting
bloke,
another
messed-up
limp-dick.
A car hooted behind her. The lights had changed.